Eric Church Talks ‘The Outsiders': ‘It’s a Cross Between Waylon and Metallica’

Eric Church is one for making statements, and he's already done that with his first single and title track off his forthcoming album. The country rocker opened about his record, single 'The Outsiders' (which he describes as a cross between Waylon and Metallica), and of course, the 2013 CMA Awards.

Church is pretty pumped about the rock-heavy track, which has country fans all over buzzing. "It's a bit of a statement. I wanted to send a message with this album that it's gonna be different, it's gonna be another level," he explains.

"It's gonna be something that we haven't done before, and at the same time, if you've ever seen us live, if you've ever been to one of our concerts, it's very much what we do," the singer tells WYRK‘s Clay Moden during the CMA Week radio broadcasts.

'The Outsiders' is the perfect example of what Church, a country rebel, loves. "I love when the song finally kicks in; it's hard when it hits -- it's like a sledgehammer," he shares.

"I love that moment of people who are turnin' it up, turnin' it up, and then you just knock them out and it takes about the end of the song to recover," admits the singer, adding, "It's a cross between Waylon and Metallica. It's very creative and it's very free-flowing with its creativity."

Church has had to be creative over the years, since he was on rocky ground in country music for awhile. Instead of that being a deterrent, it became ammunition. "When you've come up the way you've came up and everybody left us for dead many times with our career, you find out real quick who you are and what you're about," he says. "And you continue to do that."

There were several people who supported Church along the way, and he is quick to thank them, but the singer doesn't care much about winning awards at events like the 2013 CMAs.

"They mean a lot more for the people that have believed in me," he reveals. "I don't get caught up in winning or losing awards. But I want them for the people who believed. I want them for the fans, I want them for those people in radio, for those people in the industry who have always believed in us. That's what I want to win an award for, so they can stand up and say, 'I was right.'"